Learning ActionScript 3.0: A Beginner's Guide

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If you're new to ActionScript 3.0, or want to enhance your skill set, this bestselling book is the ideal guide. Designers, developers, and programmers alike will find Learning ActionScript 3.0 invaluable for navigating ActionScript 3.0's learning curve. You'll learn the language by getting a clear look at essential topics such as logic, event handling, displaying content, classes, and much more. Updated for Flash Professional CS5, this revised and expanded edition delivers hands-on exercises and full-color code samples to help you increase your abilities as you progress through the book. Topics are introduced with basic syntax and class-based examples, so you can set your own pace for learning object-oriented programming. Harness the power and performance of ActionScript 3.0 Control sound and video, including new access to microphone data Create art with code by drawing vectors and pixels at runtime Manipulate text with unprecedented typographic control Animate graphics, create particle systems, and apply simple physics Avoid common coding mistakes and reuse code for improved productivity Load SWF, image, text, HTML, CSS, and XML file formats, and more Authors Rich Shupe and Zevan Rosser draw on their experience as Flash developers and instructors to give you a solid ActionScript foundation, revealing ways you can use code for practical, everyday projects.

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Rich Shupe has been teaching ActionScript programming to students of all levels since the language became available. He founded his own training and development company, FMA, in 1995. A recognized authority on several technologies, including Flash, Director and QuickTime, Rich is a full-time faculty member in the Computer Art Department at New York's School of Visual Arts. Learning ActionScript 3.0 has been called "the best book on ActionScript ever written," by evangelist and Flash community leader Lee Brimelow. Zevan Rosser is a freelance designer/programmer/consultant and computer artist. He teaches ActionScript and Flash animation at New York's School of Visual Arts and FMA. When he's not working on commercial projects he works on his personal site, http://www.shapevent.com. Table of Contents Getting Started Chapter 1 What Is ActionScript? What's New in ActionScript 3.0? The Flash Platform Procedural Versus Object-Oriented Programming The Document Class Legacy Code Compatibility Hello World What's Next? Chapter 2 Core Language Fundamentals Jump Right In Miscellaneous Basics Variables and Data Types Operators Conditionals Loops Arrays Vectors Functions Custom Objects this and parent Absolute Versus Relative Addresses Put It All Together What's Next? Graphics and Interaction Chapter 3 Properties, Methods, and Events Jump Right In Properties Events Methods Event Propagation Frame and Timer Events Removing Event Listeners What's Next? Chapter 4 The Display List Jump Right In The Sum of Its Parts Adding and Removing Children Managing Object Names, Positions, and Data Types Changing the Display List Hierarchy A Dynamic Navigation Bar What's Next? Chapter 5 Timeline Control Jump Right In Playhead Movement Frame Labels Frame Rate A Simple Site or Application Structure What's Next? Chapter 6 OOP Classes Inheritance Composition Encapsulation Polymorphism Navigation Bar Revisited What's Next? Chapter 7 Motion Basic Movement Simple Physics A Basic Particle System Simple Collision Detection Geometry and Trigonometry Programmatic Tweening What's Next? Chapter 8 Drawing with Vectors The Graphics Class The Geometry Package 9-Slice Scaling Applied Examples What's Next? Chapter 9 Drawing with Pixels Bitmap Caching The BitmapData Class Blend Modes Bitmap Filters Color Effects Image Encoding and Saving Adding Functionality to Your Color Picker What's Next? Text Chapter 10 Text Creating Text Fields Setting Text Field Attributes Selecting Text Formatting Text Formatting with HTML and CSS Triggering ActionScript from HTML Links Loading HTML and CSS Text Layout Framework What's Next? Sound and Video Chapter 11 Sound ActionScript Sound Architecture Internal and External Sounds Playing, Stopping, and Pausing Sounds Buffering Sounds Changing Sound Volume and Pan Reading ID3 Metadata from MP3 Sounds Visualizing Sound Data Visualizing Microphone Input Recording, Playing, and Saving Microphone Input What's Next? Chapter 12 Video Encoding Components Full-Screen Video Captions Writing Your Own Player What's Next? Input/Output Chapter 13 Loading Assets Loading SWFs and Images Loading Data Communicating with Loaded SWFs Additional Online Resources What's Next? Chapter 14 XML Understanding XML Structure Creating an XML Object Using Variables in XML Reading XML Writing XML Deleting XML Loading External XML Documents Sending to and Loading from a Server An XML-Based Navigation System What's Next?